Similar to the fitness thread I started, let's talk nutrition. Nutrition for general health and to maintain a healthy weight. It doesn't matter to me how this thread drifts either so feel free to post about whatever nutrition-diet related topic you want. I have no formal nutritional background, so I claim no professional status on the topic at all (I'm just starting the thread), just a perspective from someone serious about fitness.

Nutrition is an extremely confusing topic for a number of reasons. In no particular order;

It is a relatively young science and not widely studied. Our society has "experts" who always talk to us about nutrition (doctors) yet they have little formal background in it (in no way meant to be an insult to MD's, I've heard many of them say the same).

The government via FDA puts out food guidelines, recommendations, and "pyramids." These guidelines keep contradicting themselves and changing. Major nutritional "common sense" knowledge keeps changing. For example, 50's- eggs and bacon a healthy start to the day. 70's-80's, fat is the devil and your arteries will clog and you'll DIE!! Eat cereal and use margarine (trans-fats) anything but fat. Late 90's (or early 2000's?) ooooppps, we um, totally screwed up that whole trans-fat thing, turns out butter and bacon is way better than artery scoring trans-fats! You get the point, we can go down this road with sweeteners as well.

The problems and confusion don't stop there. On this background we get to add in the massive food, agricultural, and other issue lobby groups with their influence on the government, policy, and messaging. The sugar lobby competing with big beef, dairy ("milk does a body good"...does it?) with PETA (vegan/vegetarian movement). All funding conflicting "studies" with conflicting dietary advice and scare tactics.

Now into this mix, let's throw in all the "fad" diets with their authors being motivated to make $ in addition to what I assume are sincere beliefs that their approach is best. Holy crap, it's no wonder nobody knows how to eat! Oh, and we have all sorts of nutritional advice out there that is great for specific populations or certain goals being applied to a broader base where it may not make sense.

The basics are: processed foods and sugar are bad. Whole foods are best. Whole foods are foods that don't have ingredient labels because their ingredient is their title; beef, broccoli, salmon, rice, etc. Or, foods comprised of whole food ingredients like a salad, or salsa (or any dish you cook with whole food ingredients) etc.

So, a healthy diet would be one that focuses primarily on dishes made from whole foods for the majority (90%?) and limits the processed stuff to as little as possible and keeps them on the periphery. So, dinner may be fish, rice, and a veggie, but you used a little of a store-bought marinade.

Simply drastically reducing the amount of processed food consumed and displacing it with whole foods would have a major health impact. It doesn't have to be expensive either, whole foods have a lot more nutrients so you don't need to consume as much. Whole foods include inexpensive produce and can be supplemented from a garden. Buy meats on sale and freeze them for later etc. There is really no excuse here IMHO. "I can't afford grass-fed beef and organic veggies bought at the boutique grocery" Well, neither can I, but the regular beef and green beans from your local grocery store beats the living snot out of the fast-food value meal you are trying to justify to yourself in making that statement. Don't make the perfect the enemy of the good with this. Eat..."better."

This is before going down any low carb vs. low fat, "Paleo" vs. "Vegan" vs. "Keto" or "South Beach" diet roads. A majority whole food diet is the foundation for any other direction you would take it. "Paleo" pancakes that come in a box are not "healthy." It's a fine treat on occasion, and probably "healthier" (whatever that means) than regular pancakes and syrup...but not ideal and shouldn't be a nutritional mainstay.

Oh, 2 huge pet peeves, no, neither corn nor white potatoes are "vegetables"! Not even close. Corn is used to make one of the most vile substances we can ingest (high fructose corn syrup) as well as fuel. Potatoes are just starchy carbs, almost no nutritional value. (Sweet potatoes OTOH are a different species and healthy, they have high carbs but other good nutrients). That said, do I have a corn salsa side dish on occasion, of course! It just isn't a mainstay in my diet at all.

I'm not a health nut, judge-y or "preachy" about this either. I have a huge passion for the worst kind of empty calorie alcoholic beverage. Beer! I brew it, have a 4-tap Keezer, always trying new ones. It has lots of carbs, gluten, and the hops have estrogenic qualities counter to fat loss. My favorite style is double IPA so high calorie, high carb, and high hops!

Is there really a definition of "processed" food?

At the molecular level, even heating or cooking alters the chemistry and could be called processing. Where do you draw the line?

quote:

Originally posted by MNSIG:
Is there really a definition of "processed" food?

At the molecular level, even heating or cooking alters the chemistry and could be called processing. Where do you draw the line?

That’s a moving target. In our house we try to consume foods as close as possible to the way they grew. The less done to it the better, but we don’t go crazy.

For instance, we buy Daisy brand cottage cheese not Daisy low fat cottage cheese and not the other major brands. Why? The low-fat has had something removed (fat) and then some synthetic vitamins added. The regular is “cleaner” and “wholer” by the standard we use. The other brands add other stuff like stabilizers and preservatives, so they are even “less whole”.

Steel cut oats are “less processed” that quick oats. We’ll use the steel cut.

Those are some minor examples. Again, we just try and stay as close as we can as much as we can, and we don’t worry about it when we stray.

quote:

Originally posted by MNSIG:
Is there really a definition of "processed" food?

At the molecular level, even heating or cooking alters the chemistry and could be called processing. Where do you draw the line?

Personally, I keep it simple. If it comes in a box or wrapper, it is automatically suspect. I then look at the label, if it is full of chemicals, preservatives (anything other than whole foods) I skip it (I still buy plenty of packaged stuff, almost everything is boxed or wrapped somehow).

So, Hungry Man Salisbury steak and veggie dinner No-go. But look, that cut of steak is on sale in the meat section and I can grab a handful of green beans to go with it.

If a "Paleo" fitness nut wants to argue with a raw Vegan about the finer points of what constitutes "processing" they can have at it!

Healthy cooking oils/healthy fats; Coconut, olive, and avocado (I'm sure I'm missing some). Avocado cost more but is better for high temp cooking.

Bad ones, Canola and vegetable oils (again, I'm missing more bad ones).

When it comes to seafood, you really want to buy "wild" and not "farmed". The farmed fish are kept in pens and shot full of antibiotics. Their Omega 6 vs. Omega 3 ratios are the opposite of what you want. I just buy whatever wild caught stuff is on sale and don't have it that often.

That said, "perfect being enemy of the good" again, a farm raised salmon, rice, and veggie dinner still beats the snot out of any fast food value meal or frozen box dinner!

Soy is another not so good for you ingredient. Soy sauce as an occasional condiment is fine. But Soy milk, cheese, and tofu as a staple? Nope. It is very estrogenic (like my beloved hops) and promotes fat storage etc. At extremes it can result in "man-boobs," but that takes a lot of it. There are plenty of substitute products for anything soy anyway.

Almond, coconut, and cashew milks (and blends) are good choices. Read the labels, some have lots of crap added, most don't.

Whole eggs are good, especially cage free. Again, like fish, the cage free eggs have the omega 6/3 ratios you want.

Some people recommend egg whites only, but that is just pure protein. You aren't getting the healthy fats your body needs as building blocks for all our hormones.

Nuts provide healthy fats as well. Almonds, cashews etc. "Peanuts" aren't nuts, they are actually "legumes" or beans.

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Originally posted by Strambo:
The basics are: processed foods and sugar are bad.

Not just sugar, but all refined carbs. E.g.: Anything made with white flour. White rice. Fitness geek saying: "If it's white, it ain't right."

quote:

Originally posted by Strambo:
Whole foods are best. Whole foods are foods that don't have ingredient labels because their ingredient is their title; beef, broccoli, salmon, rice, etc. Or, foods comprised of whole food ingredients like a salad, or salsa (or any dish you cook with whole food ingredients) etc.

Yup. Which, luckily for me, is the way my wife cooks

Not that we never eat stuff that comes out of a box or a can, and never go for cheap and quick carry-out, but that kind of thing constitutes only a small part of our diets.

quote:

Originally posted by Strambo:
This is before going down any low carb vs. low fat, "Paleo" vs. "Vegan" vs. "Keto" or "South Beach" diet roads.

I have never been a big believer in "dieting" of any kind, and fad diets, in particular.

Even the diet I'm on right now, in an attempt to lose lots of body fat relatively quickly: I'm still eating balanced meals. I still have carbs in my diet, for example. I've just limited all carbs and all-but-eliminated simple/refined carbs.

Please get off the "sugar is bad" train. Your body needs sugar. It runs on sugar. It will break other things down to get sugar. It doesn't care what kind of sugar it gets, because it will make it the kind it needs. Just don't consume too much of it, either all at once or over time.

Same is true of salt (NaCl). Your body needs it, just don't over do it. Turns out though, too little is worse than too much.

Going back to dinner plans for tonight

I've never been confused about what constitutes a "healthy" diet. Frankly, it's always been a matter of common sense to me.

quote:

Originally posted by ensigmatic:

Not just sugar, but all refined carbs. E.g.: Anything made with white flour. White rice. Fitness geek saying: "If it's white, it ain't right."

Absolute nonsense.

I avoid the estrogenic or otherwise endocrine disrupting ingredients or packaging. No more microwaved food wrapped in plastic, no more anything wrapped/stored in plastic (I've switched to glass bowls/containers), and I religiously read ingredient labels.

I try to go as organic as I possibly can by growing a garden and freezing/canning/freeze-drying. I also buy bulk organic fruit in the summers and can or freeze-dry those. I buy locally grown organic beef and hogs and eggs and raise my own chickens. I have also switched entirely to the more saturated fats (butter, lard, etc...). There are many studies showing that these are in fact better for you, if for no other reason than you eat less of the high fat foods as they tend to satiate you sooner. Not only that, they taste a hell of a lot better.

I feel better and my cholesterol numbers have plummeted. So far, things are going well.

It can be kind of a pain to be so picky, and yeah, I cheat on occasion (I just can't get enough of the Stouffer's Mac and Cheese), but I'd say that I've cut the unhealthy garbage food out of my diet by about 75-80%.

quote:

Your body needs sugar. It runs on sugar. It will break other things down to get sugar. It doesn't care what kind of sugar it gets, because it will make it the kind it needs. Just don't consume too much of it, either all at once or over time.

Agree in part.
Yes, everything eventually ends in the Krebs cycle in some end-function of ATP->ADP->AMP process. Mono- and disaccharides are a big part of any nutritional or digestive physiology research, at least they used to be. Haven't kept up in the last decade.

For some individuals the issue becomes 'what kind of response' does that 'sugar' load demand to produce a useful energy stream. Roughly that blood glucose level of 80-140 is more associated 'normal rational though process' and 'less psychoemotive reaction' behavior. We can live outside those rough limits but have increasingly higher disruption in measurable laboratory findings that eventually are associated in diagnosing various disease states.

Straight-shot crystal sucrose out of a sugar beet, or high fructose corn syrup, imposes considerable over load on the pancreas which affect both liver and adrenals. Way too complex to list at this point.

As a diabetic type 2 I've had to relearn and DISCIPLINE (hah!) myself into ways that seem reasonable: Don't over eat, don't eat the bad stuff, get rest/exercise/good diet/etc.

For my own metabolism, 'a doughnut' is about like 'a drink' to an alcoholic, or 'just one ciggy' to a former smoker.

quote:

Originally posted by Strambo:
Nuts provide healthy fats as well. Almonds, cashews etc. "Peanuts" aren't nuts, they are actually "legumes" or beans.

Almonds & Cashews aren't technically nuts; they're both seeds.

Portion control.

Generally - people aren't fat because they eat the wrong food.

People are fat because they eat too much food.

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Originally posted by Sig209:
Portion control.

Generally - people aren't fat because they eat the wrong food.

People are fat because they eat too much food.

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People are fat because they eat too much of the wrong food.

Keep your carbs at the recommended amounts per meal and the rest will take care of itself.

quote:

Originally posted by Balzé Halzé:

quote:

Originally posted by ensigmatic:
Not just sugar, but all refined carbs. E.g.: Anything made with white flour. White rice. Fitness geek saying: "If it's white, it ain't right."

Absolute nonsense.

In your opinion.

quote:

Originally posted by ensigmatic:
In your opinion.

There's very little in the realm of nutrition that rises beyond opinion. The confounding variables are just too great to overcome.

Eat it before it eats you.

quote:

Originally posted by ensigmatic:

quote:

Originally posted by Balzé Halzé:

quote:

Originally posted by ensigmatic:
Not just sugar, but all refined carbs. E.g.: Anything made with white flour. White rice. Fitness geek saying: "If it's white, it ain't right."

Absolute nonsense.

In your opinion.

How about this approach:

What nutrients are contained in refined carbs, specifically white four and white rice, that are either a) needed by the body and/or b) not readily available from better (read "more nutritious") sources?

quote:

Originally posted by 1s1k:
Keep your carbs at the recommended amounts per meal and the rest will take care of itself.

What is the recommended amount, who is recommending it, and why? Do we need to consume any carbs at all? If so, why is fat the only long-term energy store the body has?

quote:

Originally posted by MNSIG:

quote:

Originally posted by ensigmatic:
In your opinion.

There's very little in the realm of nutrition that rises beyond opinion. The confounding variables are just too great to overcome.

Yes, but some opinion is based on the science we know--or believe we do. In the instant case: Most "white food" is highly processed, which results in more carbs and lower nutritional value per unit measure.

It's not that "white food" is "poison," as some fitness buffs insist, to be avoided at all costs, but that there are healthier choices.